Financial services cards in the form of credit, debit and charge cards have had great success in shifting the preferred method of payment in many segments of commerce, at the individual level, away from the use of cash and checks. They are also convenient, because a) they do not require a person to carry large sums of cash in order to make a high priced purchase, and b) they are, in many instances, readily acceptable forms of payment across national boundaries.
Obtaining a credit or charge card generally requires the person seeking the card to prove a level of credit worthiness, since payment for goods and/or services purchased today with the card will not be made until some time in the future. Debit cards may or may not require proof of creditworthiness, depending upon the particular account. People lacking sufficient creditworthiness, can often obtain a credit card if it is secured by a bank account and the usable credit line was linked to the amount of money in the account.
Debit cards appear similar to credit cards from the use standpoint, however, like secured credit cards, debit cards require sufficient money to be available in an account or a transaction involving the card will not be approved.
Charge cards are like regular credit cards in that they are unsecured, however they differ in the payment requirements.
Predecessors and variants of credit, debit and charge cards are store specific (for example, Sears or KMart) or chain specific (for example, Hertz) charge plates and travel and entertainment cards (for example, Diners Club, or AirTravel Card).
A common feature to all of those types of cards are that they are registered in the name of the cardholder, and the registration is evidenced by the cardholder name appearing in human readable form on the card, either through imprinting on a surface which may be further laminated over for durability, or using a method which causes the name to be elevated above the surface of the card or recessed into the surface of the card as if it was carved or engraved.
A further type of card which may be used as a form of payment are stored value cards and electronic modules, wallets and/or purses. While stored value cards represent physically producible tangible things, electronic modules are less so because, in some instances, they are part of a computer or terminal which is not readily carried from place to place. Electronic wallets or purses may be considered intangible to the extent they are not physically presentable, but may be considered as tangible to the extent that there may be a requirement for registration of the module, wallet or purse for traceability of transactions as well as the requirement for additional authenticity certification and/or cryptographic data which is necessary to ensure that the user is who they purport to be or the electronic “money” is valid.
The stored value cards fall into two classes: a) bearer, and b) registered. Bearer cards do not require any form of user identification or registration and contain no identification information, thus they may be used by anyone possessing the card. Example of bearer stored value cards are transit fare cards, photocopy cards. Registered cards require some form of user identification and/or registration to be used. An example being the trusted modules described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,557,518.
A disadvantage of all of the above cards is the lack of any degree of anonymity afforded to the user of the cards because, when the card, module, wallet or purse is issued and/or rendered usable, the cardholder's name and address are contained on the card in human readable or some form of coded or machine readable form.
Persons seeking a degree of anonymity associated with financial services card usage have been able to enlist the assistance of third parties who, for a substantial fee, will obtain a credit card for a person in a name selected by the person, typically through an offshore bank. In order to obtain the card however, the third party still requires proof of identity (an ID) but, if the person does not have an ID in the selected name, the third party can obtain that too. The person also needs a foreign mail drop in the selected name which will serve as the billing address for monthly statements and a security deposit equal to the maximum credit line.
Similarly, people in show business who use a “stage name” instead of their legal given name, may obtain a financial services card in the stage name. However, that practice affords those persons less anonymity than would likely result from their using their legal given name on the card.